Improving the prediction of coronary heart disease to aid in the management of high cholesterol levels: what a difference a decade makes.
BACKGROUND
A patient's coronary heart disease (CHD) risk must be correctly classified to successfully apply risk-based guidelines for treatment of hypercholesterolemia.


OBJECTIVE
To determine the classification accuracy of the National Cholesterol Education Program (NCEP) CHD risk-stratification system and compare it with a simple revised system that gives greater weight to age as a CHD risk factor.


METHODS
Modeling of 10-year CHD risk, using equations from the Framingham Heart Study applied to a cross-sectional survey of the US population.


METHODS
The 3284 subjects aged 20 to 74 years surveyed in the Second National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (1978-1982) who had fasting lipid levels measured.


METHODS
The area under the receiver operating characteristic curve (AUC) for 10-year CHD risk for the NCEP and revised scales.


RESULTS
Among all adults with a low-density lipoprotein cholesterol value of at least 4.1 mmol/L (160 mg/dL), the NCEP system showed fairly good discrimination (AUC=0.90), though there was a substantial decline among men 35 to 74 years old and women 55 to 74 years old (AUC=0.81). By contrast, the revised system showed superior performance in all hypercholesterolemic adults (AUC=0.94-0.97) as well as in the subgroup of men 35 to 74 years old and women 55 to 74 years old (AUC=0.94-0.96).


CONCLUSIONS
Simple modifications of the NCEP treatment criteria result in a substantially improved ability to discriminate between higher and lower CHD risk groups. Unlike the NCEP system, this revised system retains its classification ability in all age groups studied.
Avins
A L
AL
Veterans Affairs Medical Center, Department of Epidemiology and Biostatistics, University of California, San Francisco 94121, USA. andy_avins@quickmail.ucsf.edu
Browner
W S
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D000328:Adult; D000368:Aged; D019540:Area Under Curve; D008078:Cholesterol, LDL / Q000097:blood*; D003327:Coronary Disease / Q000097:blood / Q000453:epidemiology / Q000517:prevention & control*; D003430:Cross-Sectional Studies; D005260:Female; D006266:Health Education; D006801:Humans; D006937:Hypercholesterolemia / Q000097:blood / Q000628:therapy*; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D009313:National Health Programs; D017410:Practice Guidelines as Topic; D012372:ROC Curve; D012307:Risk Factors; D014481:United States / Q000453:epidemiology
D008078:Cholesterol, LDL